So-called "I/O Headers", i.e., input/output headers, are a typical component of electrical connectors, constituted of a body of electrically insulative material, generally rectangular in outline, with upstanding end walls and sidewalls extending between the end walls, the walls collectively defining therewithin a compartment for receipt of a mating plug, and a base or floor at the interior of the compartment and supporting electrical contact members, e.g., contact pins upstanding from the base to enter female contacts of the mating plug on insertion of the mating plug into the header. While what has been described is a male header, the industry also encompasses female headers, wherein the contacts of the mating plug are adapted for the receipt of contact pins extending outwardly of the mating plug.
Headers, themselves, are resident in such as a PCB (printed circuit board) or other support housing.
In various applications, it is imperative to provide sealing at respective mating surfaces, i.e., in the described header-mating plug-PCB instance, as between the header and the mating plug and as between the header and the PCB. Known headers do not themselves incorporate sealing facility. Sealing members are thus provided, separately from the header, to effect the requisite sealing as against ambient environment, e.g., ingress of moisture therefrom into the header.
Disadvantage attends the known practices in that sealing components need be inventoried separately from the headers, mating plugs and PCBs and in that connection assembly is labor-intensive in requiring steps of effecting sealing apart from simple mating of headers, mating plugs and PCBs. Further, sealing components which are provided separately from headers are subject to damage in handling and then suffer in effectiveness upon assembly with headers.